Arthro-Pod EP 162: The Insect Head

Hello bug lovers! On today's episode of Arthro-Pod, the gang will be taking you on a journey through the first section of an insect's body, the head. This magnificent center for information gathering and processing has many wonderful adaptations of internal and external anatomy that it's truly a marvel to dissect and consider. Tune in to hear all about how the insect head came to be, what important processes occur in the head, and how fun it is to have your esophagus run through the middle of your brain!

 

Show notes

• Joro spider: https://jorowatch.org/  
• Link to 1975 Head Problem Paper 
• Antennae 
• Compound eyes 
• How bees see flowers: https://photographyoftheinvisibleworld.blogspot.com/2007/10/simulated-bee-vision-ii.html 
• Treehopper heads: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/treehoppers-bizarre-wondrous-helmets-use-wing-genes-grow-180973713/  

 Questions? Comments? 

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Arthro-Pod EP 144: On the Fly with Insect Wings

 

Howdy bug lovers! Last episode, we started our discussion of insect locomotion by getting up close and personal with insect legs. Today, we'll be a little more airborne as we discuss insect wings. Insects are the only invertebrates with the power of flight and there have long been questions about the origin of insect wings in the evolutionary record. Tune in to hear about the multiple theories on the origin of wings, how wings help with insect identification, and just how bugs take flight. 

Show notes

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/244541v1 

https://news.uchicago.edu/story/how-insect-wings-evolved-legs-ancestral-crustacean 

https://www.the-scientist.com/notebook/unearthing-the-evolutionary-origins-of-insect-wings-69845 

https://ag.arizona.edu/classes/ento596c/topic/session4.html

https://www.amentsoc.org/insects/fact-files/wings.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insect_wing

https://cronodon.com/BioTech/Insect_locomotion.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insect_flight

Questions? Comments? 

Follow the show on Twitter @Arthro_Podshow

Follow the hosts on Twitter @bugmanjon, @JodyBugsmeUNL, and @MSkvarla36

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Arthro-Pod EP 143 Bugs Have Legs and they Know How to Use Them

Howdy bug lovers! Over the next two episodes, the Arthro-Pod gang is going to be talking about insect locomotion, how they move through the world. In part one today, we're covering insect legs from hip to toe or rather coxa to tarsi. Tune in to learn about insect leg anatomy, the different types of legs and their function, and how legs were evolved in the insects. 

Show notes

https://cronodon.com/BioTech/Insect_locomotion.html

https://academic-accelerator.com/encyclopedia/arthropod-leg

https://www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/~rider/Pentatomoidea/Teaching%20Structure/Lecture%20Notes/Week%2007a%20Legs.pdf

https://genent.cals.ncsu.edu/bug-bytes/thorax/legs/, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthropod_adhesion

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.20.427514v2.full

Questions? Comments? 

Follow the show on Twitter @Arthro_Podshow

Follow the hosts on Twitter @bugmanjon, @JodyBugsmeUNL, and @MSkvarla36

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Arthro-Pod EP 130: Eat, digest, poop- how insects eat

 

Insects are extremely diverse. Part of that diversity is apparent in the ways that they consume their preferred food. Today, inspired by an anonymous listener question, the Arthro-Pod gang goes over the different types of insect mouths and how they help insects to begin the process of digestion. Then join them as they traverse the three "guts" of insects and end up on the other side of the anus with insect frass. It's an episode with lots of colorful descriptions and turns of phrase, that's for sure. 

Insect mouths come in different shapes and perform different jobs but they contain the same parts across most of the board; a labrum, the mandibles, maxillae, the hypopharnyx, and the labium

Chewing mouths are the most common of all mouths, found on predators and herbivores such as this grasshopper

Chewing-lapping mouthparts can chew pollen and help with lapping up honey and nectar

Siphoning mouthparts are unique, they have been modified to curl up and unfurl and help slurp up nectar

Piercing-sucking mouthparts can be used to suck juices from plants, or as this wheel bug would do, to suck the juices from prey

Sponging mouthparts are found on many flies, they use these to acquire liquid food

Show notes

https://genent.cals.ncsu.edu/bug-bytes/digestive-system/

https://www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/~rider/Pentatomoidea/Teaching%20Structure/Lecture%20Notes/Week%2011a%20Digestive%20System.pdf

Some of Jody's favorite bug poo

Drywood termite frass is quite distinct

Tomato hornworm frass is often compared to the shape of a hand grenade

Here a tortoise shell beetle uses frass as a defensive shield

Questions? Comments? 

Follow the show on Twitter @Arthro_Podshow

Follow the hosts on Twitter @bugmanjon, @JodyBugsmeUNL, and @MSkvarla36

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This episode is freely available on archive.org and is licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Beginning/ending theme: "There It Is" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0